Market Momentum: IT Services And Outsourcing Market, H1 2008

The IT services and outsourcing market is in the midst of a fundamental transformation that will eventually lead to a new IT ecosystem framed by new constituencies of buyers and suppliers, all supported by new, standardized global processes for the development and delivery of technology. Forrester's market momentum documents look at the key measures that IT service providers and outsourcers are currently taking in order to get ready for the new IT ecosystem. For the first half of 2008, we tracked 270 different activities across the four core categories of mergers and acquisitions, partnerships, new services and solutions, and changes in go-to-market and delivery strategies. We found that service providers are recognizing the growing importance of collaborative alliances with both other tech vendors and clients; however, they are only making rather selective use of acquisitions to complement and strengthen their portfolios. New service offerings tend to focus on popular themes like SOA, Web 2.0, and green IT but have yet to evolve further to provide true value to clients.